Artist: J.M. Clifford
Hometown: Allendale, New Jersey
Song: “Kick the Drum”
Album: On a Saturday Night
Release Date: August 26, 2021
In Their Words: “’Here’s to the music that we make at night till we feel alright.’ I honestly don’t know what would have become of me if I hadn’t fallen in with the bluegrass community at Sunny’s Bar in Red Hook, Brooklyn in 2017. The music and the musicians got me through some very dark times. This is really a love song to that whole scene. This was the first tune I wrote for the record (although it went through about a hundred revisions). In fact, it’s the first thing I had written in a long, long time. Stylistically it was very different from anything I had done before. I integrated some of the prominent features of the old folk and bluegrass music I’d been immersing myself in with my singer-songwriter background and landed on something that felt fresh to me. That approach informed all of the songs that came after it.” — J.M. Clifford
Photo credit: Nicole Mago
